Couch Sleeping

For some reason, I was just not able to fall asleep on Sunday. I was tossing and turning in bed, throwing blankets off and then pulling them back on, trying to breathe deep and think of the color black, and it wasn't working. It didn't even work when I got up and went to my loveseat and curled up on there.

I did finally fall asleep, around 3 a.m., and it was back in bed and not on my short couch. When I was a kid, I used to turn around and sleep with my head at the foot of my bed on nights when I couldn't fall asleep. As a last resort, I'd trundle myself into my parents' bedroom and sleep on the floor on there, usually near the dog.

Today, the couch is my go-to place for when I can't sleep. It's awkward in my apartment, since my couch is so short. (It really is a loveseat.) It's nice at Dan's place, since he has a long and wide hand-me-down couch from a friend's parents. They bought nice furniture, quality stuff, and when they replaced their living room stuff, he got a couch and a loveseat. I've napped on both, slept on both, and even today I'll still spend the night on there occasionally. Usually it's when Dan is extremely drunk and won't stop snoring/taking up obnoxious amounts of the bed, but whatever. It's still good.

My parents' couches have been through cycles. They used to have a really good one, then got rid of it for a couch that was slightly shorter and narrower, juuuust enough smaller to make one have to pay attention where to put the pillow. If you tried to move too far down, you'd end up cramped. Now they have another couch, and it's leather, and frankly, I'm afraid of sliding off it.

There was a leather couch in the science journalism lounge at BU that was marvelous. It was scrounged by one of the students a year ahead of us, and this thing was long, deep, worn and so comfortable. It wasn't uncommon for a few of us to curl up on it between classes. A lot of last-minute studying happened on that couch. I spent the night on it once, too. It was a Friday, and some of us stuck around to get drunk off the free beer and wine offered to some grad student tour thing or some such. We drank a ridiculous amount down there, then snuck bottles of beer and wine into the lounge (we all learned how to jimmy the lock open, since there weren't enough keys to go around).

Long story short, I proceeded to get shit-faced and was also having a mental breakdown of sorts, related to my own neuroticisms and fears of the future spiraling out of control, and Eric was the one who put me to bed on the couch when everyone else left to go catch the last train. I slept there until about 7 a.m. the next morning, then stumbled down the stairs, out of the building and out to wait for the train back to my own bed. The couch was damn comfortable. I miss that couch.

I know Dan will sleep on the couch--he's actually probably the person who got me into serious couch sleeping. Before we dated, when we were just friends and he had a jealous girlfriend, I'd sleep on his couch at his apartment occasionally after we'd been up late watching dumb movies on TV. She was too jealous for me to have ever thought about taking the bed, even if he volunteered it and took the couch himself. Someday, when we have a place together, I want to have a long, wide couch that comfortably naps two people. It'll also be a great place for me to go on nights when I just can't fall asleep on the bed.